Communication network resources, such as wired or wireless communication media, and routing, queueing, and processing resources within the network infrastructure, are typically shared between multiple client devices. It is generally desirable to share these resources between devices in such a way that each device is permitted to communicate in a timely manner. Effectiveness of resource sharing can be improved when resource schedulers have knowledge of the devices which are expected to have data to transmit at a given time. However, determining when each device has data to transmit is not straightforward.
Devices coupled to a communication network often include a transmit buffer which holds messages pending transmission. In LTE systems. Buffer Status Reports (BSRs) can be used to provide the serving evolved NodeB (eNB) with information regarding the amount of data available for transmission in the uplink transmission buffers of a client User Equipment (UE) device. However, communication of BSRs requires potentially significant network overhead.
Therefore there is a need for supporting communication resource sharing that mitigates or obviates one or more limitations of the prior art.
This background information is provided to reveal information believed by the applicant to be of possible relevance to the present invention. No admission is necessarily intended, nor should be construed, that any of the preceding information constitutes prior art against the present invention.